Today, new customers are always going to be wary of your business—at first.
This isn’t your fault, and it isn’t a result of the work that you’ve done in the past or the values that you hold. Quite simply, what with all choice they’re bombarded with day in, day out, and because of all the scam companies out there that have let them down before, customers always err on the side of caution when choosing who to take their business to.
For this reason, you have to do all you can to make new customers trust you and your business right off the bat. Here’s a guide on how to do just that.
Embrace social proof marketing
Social proof marketing is a type of advertising in which customers can evaluate for themselves what they think about a business based on the actions and reviews of others. Its effectiveness stems from the fact that people like to form their future decisions from the experiences other consumers have had in the past. It shows them exactly how the product or service they are being coerced into buying can work for them and their individual situation.
The type of social proof marketing that would best suit your business in your quest to induce trust is customer action proof. This strand stems from real people giving and listening to word-of-mouth reviews. To run such an advertising campaign effectively in today’s climate, you would have to ask your existing or past customers to leave reviews of you on your social media pages, and you would then have to display these reviews for all your new customers to see. In this venture, turn to Facebook first.
Other types of social proof marketing that could work equally as well include testimonial proof, which comprises of generic reviews, and authority proof, which revolves around PR and critic reviews.
Prove that you will handle their data with care
Customers value having privacy, and they won’t even consider a business if it can’t provide it for them. For this reason, to show new customers that yours is a business that will treat their desire for privacy with the utmost respect, you have to be going out of your way to showcase what it is you do when it comes to the handling of their personal data.
Today, this means ensuring that you are up to date with GDPR compliance rules. More importantly, it means displaying that this is the fact whenever somebody reaches your company website for the first time. To do this, you should ensure that a message regarding the EU’s General Data Protection Regulation pops up on your new customer’s screen whenever they visit your site. If you process EU citizen data, whether you trade in Europe or not, this is something that you, by law, have to do. This message should make them aware of just how you plan on harnessing the personal data that they bring to you, and it should give them the chance to agree or disagree with certain requests depending on how comfortable they are with them.
If you don’t show yourself to be trustworthy when it comes to the handling of sensitive, private customer data, then you will not draw any customers to you.
Be available at all times
Because you’ve never provided a service for them before, new customers will send a lot of queries your way in regards to the way you work and what it is exactly that you can offer them. For this reason, you have to be available to answer their questions at all conceivable points. Of course, you can’t offer this kind of support around the clock, but during your working hours, you should be doing all you can to be there, such as responding to messages promptly and making more points of contact available. If you feel a particularly inquisitive new customer could benefit from having a stronger line of connection with you, then this could entail you giving them a personal number to call you on.
As stated, new customers will always be wary of your business’s ability to provide them the product or service that they want from you at first. For this reason, you need to set about forging a trustworthy relationship between you both right away. When you do, you’ll soon find your newest customers trusting you just as you much as your oldest and most established ones do.